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Is Flouride Harmful?

Health Sciences Institute e-AlertJuly 15, 2002Dear Reader,

It was right there in front of me and I still couldn't believe it. Watching TV last weekend I saw an advertisement for a new product from Dannon: bottled water for kids called "Fluoride to Go."The pitch? "Why give your child soda full of sugar? Instead offer them Dannon Fluoride to Go - a convenient, satisfying way to help your child build strong teeth." So now Dannon offers you a choice: you can give the kids sodas with all the added sugar, or you can give them water with all the added toxins.

What?

Well, in case you didn't know it, fluoride is highly toxic. In fact, before fluoride was deemed a "cavity fighter," it was used as insecticide and rat poison. It's true. Even more surprising is that when it comes to dental hygiene, fluoride actually does more harm than good.

Everything you always DIDN'T want to know about fluoride

For decades the message that fluoride safely prevents tooth decay has been considered sacrosanct. This idea came from the same "chemicals for better living" era that also told us that smoking cigarettes soothed the throat.Now for a brief history lesson: please switch off the lights and turn on the projector...

Fluoride is a pollutant - a by-product of copper, iron and aluminum manufacturing. The problem of how to legally dispose of fluoride was solved in the 1930's when a study (funded by one of the country's largest aluminum companies) concluded that fluoride prevented tooth decay. A successful public relations effort, helped along with some cooperative government cronies, resulted in the good news going out: this miracle chemical, when added to water supplies, will give everyone healthy teeth and brighter smiles.

Got fluoride?

But does fluoride actually prevent tooth decay? Not according to the largest study ever conducted on fluoridation and oral health. 39,000 school children in 84 areas around the U.S. were studied in the mid-80's, and the results showed no statistical difference in tooth decay rates between fluoridated and non-fluoridated cities.

Meanwhile, tooth decay trends tracked by the World Health Organization from 1970 to the present show that the incidence of decayed, missing or filled teeth has been steadily in decline with each passing year in the U.S., France, Germany, Japan, Italy, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Norway, The Netherlands, Northern Ireland, Austria, Belgium, Portugal, Iceland and Greece. And why are the numbers of decayed teeth on the decline? Better oral hygiene and improved dental practice is the most obvious answer. It's certainly not the fluoride. Because of all of those countries, only one adds fluoride to the public water supply: the United States.

A few of the countries listed above used to put fluoride in some of their water, but they eventually wised up to the dangers of this aluminum by-product. And here's some truly radical thinking for you: many of those countries simply refuse to run fluoride through every citizen's faucets based on the idea that health treatments should be a personal choice and not mandated by the government. What a concept!

Downside takes a down turn

So how is fluoride bad for you? To start with, the irony is that when you consume too much fluoride, your teeth can become discolored and crumble. But that's nothing compared to the other ways that fluoride attacks your mind and body.

In tests on laboratory animals, fluoride has been shown to enhance the brain's absorption of aluminum - the substance that's found in the brains of most Alzheimer's patients. Three different osteoporosis studies have associated hip fractures with fluoridation. And excessive fluoride has been shown to damage the musculoskeletal and nervous systems, leading to limited joint mobility, ligament calcification, muscular degeneration and neurological deficits.And finally (I saved the worst till last), a number of different studies have linked fluoride to as many as 10,000 cancer deaths per year, with a high incidence of bone cancer among men exposed to fluoridated water.

In the meantime, local, state and federal government agencies across the U.S. do their best to simply dismiss all this bad news. Unlike their European counterparts, they're sticking to their outdated and baseless claims that the stuff is good for you. Why? If I had to guess, I'd say it's because they're terrified that if they admit that fluoride is poison, the deluge of resulting civil law suits just might wash them away.

Hydrofluoric Acid (the source of most flouride) in any dose above a minute levels is highly detrimental to your health lol. It isn't like a Hydrochloric or Sulfuric that will burn your skin first and can be rinsed or neutralized, Hydrofluoric likes to go right to the bone and start breaking down the calcium in your bones leading to toxification and burning from the inside out.

Chances are if you get more than 15 to 20 square inches on your skin you better kiss your loved ones goodbye. Even with aggressive calcium treatments chances are great you'd die from heart or kidney failure but in tooth past amounts it's harmless.

Like anything else, you probably don't want to take too much of it. But in small doses the research seems pretty conclusive that there's little to no danger.

What NY's talking about is some very serious stuff. But that really has nothing to do with flouride and tooth health, anymore than the fact that chlorine is a part of table salt really means anything.

I don't really think it's conclusive at all. There's been plenty of conflicting opinions about the actual usefulness of fluoride to begin with. CDC has recommended it be removed from drinking water, several counties & cities have banned fluoride from drinking water.

Here's a couple more dentists that talk about the importance of using fluoride-free products.

Another Dentist talking about it's toxicity

Doctor;

I'm not trying to get anyone to stop using their Colgate if they don't want to, I just know that I won't be using fluoride toothpaste or water for me or any future children I might have.

As you wish, but it's false equivalence to put it on the same level as the research that shows it to be useful or at minimum not harmful. It's a marginal theory. Doesn't make it wrong. But "conflicting reports" makes it sound like there is a large scale, genuine schism in the medical community when the reality is the doctors against fluoridation are basically like those climatologists who don't believe in climate change (it's not hard to find videos of them, either).

What CDC are you referring to, by the way? Because the Centers for Disease Control calls fluoridation one of the greatest public health achievements of the 20th century.

As you wish, but it's false equivalence to put it on the same level as the research that shows it to be useful or at minimum not harmful. It's a marginal theory. Doesn't make it wrong. But "conflicting reports" makes it sound like there is a large scale, genuine schism in the medical community when the reality is the doctors against fluoridation are basically like those climatologists who don't believe in climate change (it's not hard to find videos of them, either).

What CDC are you referring to, by the way? Because the Centers for Disease Control calls fluoridation one of the greatest public health achievements of the 20th century.

I'd rather just not take my chances with something that some doctors say might have an aiding effect in degenerative brain damage; early onset of Alzheimer's, that sort of thing. I don't think that poison label on your toothpaste is there because of the peppermint.

Through fact sheets on its website, it lists cautions about and problems with the ingestion of too much fluoride, including new indications that mixing instant baby formula with fluoridated water can increase the chance of mild fluorosis, an abnormal mouth condition, in infants.The Department of Health and Human Services is proposing a reduction in the recommended optimal level of fluoride in drinking water from a range of 0.7 to 1.2 milligrams per liter to 0.7 milligrams.Here are excerpts about fluoridation from the CDCís website, www.cdc.gov, ranging from lifelong-exposure risks to what kind of bottled water to buy to avoid fluoride to sources of the fluoride used in fluoridating water.

We have differing opinions on the toothpaste & that's fine, but I think most people would prefer non-fluoridated water to water with fluoride in it. I think the fluoridation of the water supply is the product of a nanny-state with good intentions that could possibly be doing more harm than good. Even most of your fluoride supporting dentists will suggest that fluoride is most effectively applied topically to the teeth & not ingested into the body. On the toothpaste label it says "If more than used for brushing is accidentally swallowed, get medical help or contact a Poison Control Center right away". So I don't think anyone should want that even in minute levels in a drinking supply if it even had the slightest possibility of having harming effects.